Ta-Da!!

Well, there was excitement in the Science house last night...

We were at a meeting with our parenting group and all the babes were playing on the floor, surrounded by approximately 283 toys. Little Bean had a ball of which she was particularly fond and she was crawling around and pulling up with this ball in her hand(s). Well, she pulls up on my leg and is standing there, one hand on my knee and one hand holding the ball... then she lets go of my knee so that she can examine the ball with both hands. And she stands there. Not holding onto anything. For like 30 seconds.

It was freaking incredible.

Before I had the Bean, I thought that motor skill development happened in these magical Ah-Ha! moments. You hear about baby's first word, the first time baby crawls, the baby's first steps. But it doesn't really happen like that. When Bean started crawling, she didn't just one day up and crawl. She was on her belly, dragging herself an inch here, and inch there... and gradually over the course of about a month she went from army crawling to up-on-all-fours crawling. So there wasn't really a moment(!) to write down in the baby book or whatever. When Bean started to pull up, it was a gradual thing too... First grabbing onto the couch, occasionally making it up to her knees. Then onto her feet for a minute before toppling over. Then finally making it to standing. And after that the cruising came over the course of about a week.

But last night was a real Ta-Da! moment. For the first time, Bean surprised us. I was so excited, frankly, that I could have peed my pants. Okay, maybe I did a little. Bean repeated her performance several times last night, and each time my heart grew three sizes.

That little Bean is on her way. She'll be walking soon, and then we're really in for some trouble...